Strong net play and blocking has always been something Hutchinson Community College volleyball coach Ronda Shirley demands.

Wednesday

Oct 15, 2008 at 12:01 AMOct 15, 2008 at 6:00 PM

Brad Hallier - The Hutchinson News - bhallier@hutchnews.com

A concern early in this season, Shirley saw the 17th-ranked Blue Dragons swat away attack after attack from Seward County on Wednesday at the Sports Arena.

From the first point, when freshmen Debbie Ohl and Kelli Johnson combined for a block point on All-American candidate Jelena Simic, the Blue Dragons showed Shirley they can dominate a good hitting team. Playing in front of a large, partisan crowd, Hutchinson rolled to a 25-13, 25-22, 25-17 win.

"I was proud that the first point was against their strongest hitter," Shirley said. "You can really take a little wind out of their sail if you can block and get points off the block right away."

Hutchinson (19-14, 8-0 Jayhawk West) is 11/2 games ahead of Seward County (30-11, 7-2) and Pratt for first place in the West.

Hutchinson ended up with 20 block assists and 10 block points. The Blue Dragons had five in the first set, three in the second and two in the third, and Ohl and sophomore Molly Bergkamp led the way with five block assists.

"One of our focuses was to get them out of their rhythm on their hits," said Ohl, a former Hutchinson Trinity standout who added eight kills and a .727 hitting percentage. "This is our house, our court. We weren't going to let them take us out of it."

Hutchinson was in trouble just once in the three sets just four days after beating the Saints in four sets in Liberal. Leading 21-13 in the second set, the Saints stormed back to get within 23-21 after a Lindsey Miller ace serve.

But the Dragons answered with a kill from sophomore Barbara Mafra, who had a strong match with eight kills and three block assists, and a Rafaella Dornelas kill sealed the set.

"I guess I played good. I just did what I had to do," Mafra said. "The team played good too, and everyone did what they needed to do to win."